Socket 939 Roundup: Battle at the Top
by Wesley Fink on July 30, 2004 8:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
Asus A8V Deluxe: Overclocking and Stress Testing
FSB Overclocking Results
| Front Side Bus Overclocking Testbed | ||
| Processor: | Athlon 64 FX53 Socket 939 2.4GHz |
|
| CPU Voltage: | 1.5V (default) | |
| Cooling: | Thermaltake Silent Boost K8 | |
| Power Supply: | Antec TruePower 430W | |
| Maximum OC: (Standard Ratios) |
204 x 13 2652MHz (+10.5%) |
|
| Maximum FSB: (Lower Ratio) |
289x9 (2601) at 1:1 Memory | |
The A8V Deluxe Revision 2 has come a long way from the first revision that didn't even have an AGP/PCI lock. Revision 2 is in a virtual dead heat with our top-performing MSI K8N Neo2 at 289 x9 with our Shikatronics DDR550 memory. The A8V also matched the highest OC with this FX53 at 204x13 at default voltage. This overclocking performance is as good as we are accustomed to seeing on the best nForce3 Ultra boards, and can only be called superb when achieved with the VIA K8T800 PRO, which is not always the best overclocker. To achieve this overclock level, we needed to reduce the base Hyper Transport frequency to 800.
Memory Stress Test Results:
The memory stress test measures the ability of the the Asus A8V Deluxe to operate at its officially supported memory frequency (400MHz DDR) at the best performing memory timings our Mushkin PC3500 Level 2 or OCZ PC3500 Platinum Ltd Modules will support. Memory stress testing was conducted by running RAM at 400MHz with 2 DIMM slots operating in Dual-Channel mode. The memory configuration of the Asus is the more standard setup with slots 1 and 3 are the first Dual Channel.| Stable DDR400 Timings - 2 DIMMs (2/4 DIMMs - 1 Dual-Channel Bank) |
|
| Clock Speed: | 200MHz |
| Timing Mode: | N/A |
| CAS Latency: | 2.0 |
| Bank Interleave: | Enabled |
| RAS to CAS Delay: | 3T |
| RAS Precharge: | 10T* |
| Precharge Delay: | 2T |
| Command Rate: | 1T |
The Asus K8V Deluxe Rev.2 was completely stable with 2 dimms in Dual-Channel at the settings of 2-2-3-10 at 2.6V default voltage with 1T command rate. This is very slightly slower than the timings than worked on other Socket 939 boards. While we could run the majority of benchmarks at 2-2-2 timings, there were a few that were not completely stable until we increased Ras-to-Cas delay to 3. It should be noted that the BH5 memory modules we used for testing are no longer available for purchase, but we have not yet established our standard memory for future testing. We will be using a new standard memory in future motherboard tests.
As we first found in our latest Socket 754 roundup, the Command Rate is very important for top performance on a VIA chipset motherboard. The best performance is at a Command Rate of 1T, and the Asus A8V was completely stable at a 1T setting with 2 dimms. We set 'Bank Interleave' to 'Enabled' in the BIOS, and Sandra 2004 SP2 reported a 2-way Bank Interleave was being used by the memory controller. With an on-CPU memory controller with Athlon 64, this is not as important a setting as it is on with chipset-based memory controllers.
Filling all four available memory slots is more strenuous on the memory subsystem than testing 2 DIMMs on a motherboard.
| Stable DDR400 Timings - 4 DIMMs (4/4 DIMMs - 2 Dual-Channel Banks) |
|
| Clock Speed: | 200MHz |
| Timing Mode: | N/A |
| CAS Latency: | 2.0 |
| Bank Interleave: | Enabled |
| RAS to CAS Delay: | 2T |
| RAS Precharge: | 10T* |
| Precharge Delay: | 2T |
| Command Rate: | 2T |
We see a very interesting result with all 4 dimm banks filled. The Asus A8V was able to run with all 4 dimm slots at more aggressive 2-2-2-10 settings than the 2-2-3-10 required for 2 dimms. Please keep in mind, though, that the Command Rate must be reduced to 2T when filling both Dual Channels, and the memory is actually a bit slower even though the other timings are slightly faster. The A8V Deluxe is also very picky about the settings that are used with 4 dimms in the 'Enable 2T' option in BIOS. If an Auto setting is used with 4 dimms the board tries to set 1T and single channel memory at a lower memory speed. If 'Auto' is selected and memory timings are forced to DDR400 the board would not boot. With 4 dimms, you will need to set the 2T option to 'Enable 2T' for proper Dual-Channel operation at DDR400.
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harsaphes - Sunday, October 10, 2004 - link
just set up my a8v board. no go on firewire, will not see ipod or external firewire drive. any idea?...bad board maybe?kd4yum - Thursday, August 5, 2004 - link
Fender - Wednesday, August 4, 2004 - link
The first words in this review confirm that you should never buy a VIA product before they revised it! (KT266 to 400 saga anyone?)Also, it's oddly that Hyperions used here are 8 months old...
It could be interesting if you include, in your tests, any possible issue concerning OS installation or updating drivers (from the CD included in the box to the updated drivers from the manufacturer's site) because this is what happens to most buyers out there. Remember that you're testing a 64bit CPU with a 32bit OS, and drivers development will be a further support insurance.
Wesley Fink - Tuesday, August 3, 2004 - link
#79 - Page 13 is corrected. That error slipped past 3 proofreaders. Thank you for alerting us.Sidewinder0010 - Tuesday, August 3, 2004 - link
the k8t neo2 overclocking page has a typo that was throwing me off"much lower than the 290 on the K8T Neo2"
That should be changed to k8n neo2
Compddd - Friday, July 30, 2004 - link
Wesley, did Asus say when the A8V Rev 2.0 will be hitting Retail Stores like Fry's, Best Buy, etc?thebluesgnr - Friday, July 30, 2004 - link
How does the lower bandwidth (4900Mb/s) affect real world performance?One more thing, perhaps the MSI K8T Neo2 Platinum references should be changed to MSI K8T Neo2-FIR? That's the name of this board on MSI's site, there's no mention of it being a Platinum board. And here's a link of all the boards in the Platinum series: http://www.msicomputer.com/pressrelease/platinum.a...
Off-Topic: Wesley, will there be reviews on AnandTech of Socket A mobos based on the nForce2 Ultra 400Gb and VIA KT880 chipsets? They offer the exact same features of the mobos on this roundup, and with the new Semprons and the good XP-Mobiles I suspect a lot of your readers are still interested in this socket.
Sorry for the off-topic.
Wesley Fink - Friday, July 30, 2004 - link
#75 - You are confusing boards as MSI had TWO boards in the roundup. We had no problems at all with the first or second K8N Neo2 (based on nForce3 Ultra) we tested, and that is the board that received the Gold Editors Choice. The MSI K8T Neo2, based on the VIA K8T800 PRO, was the problem board and we definitely did NOT give the K8T Neo2 an award.#74 - On page 5 we talk about the memory bandwidth differences in 1T and 2T command rates: "The best performance is at a Command Rate of 1T, and the Abit AV8 was completely stable at a 1T setting with 2 DIMMs. Standard memory bandwidth measured with SiSoft Sandra 2004 SP2 shows a 6000 MB/s bandwidth with 1T Command Rate compared to a 5000 MB/s bandwidth with a 2T setting." This is also mentioned on page 11: "While a full memory comparison of the nVidia and VIA chipsets is beyond the scope of this roundup, we did run several SiSoft Sandra 2004 SP2 runs of the memory test module. At default settings, and the aggressive 2-2-2-10 timings on the FX53, the nF3-250 Ultra showed memory bandwidth in the 6100 range for FPU and Float. The same test on the VIA K8T800 PRO boards showed memory bandwidth in the 6000 range. Performance of both chipsets at the 1T setting was very similar. 2T Command Rates, with everything else the same, generated bandwidths of 4900 to 5000Mb/second."
Z80 - Friday, July 30, 2004 - link
Considering your statement "Our concern is based on the fact that we went through 3 K8T Neo2 boards before we got one that really worked" I'm surprised that you went ahead and gave the MSI board your gold award. I see that MSI is being sued for intentionally using capacitors that were made with an improperly-formulated electrolyte solution. My personal experience with MSI quality assurance was never good at least back in the day it wan't but maybe they have changed like you say OCZ has? I'll stick with Asus and Abit, thank you.SignalPST - Friday, July 30, 2004 - link
quote from the article:"We even found that all six of the tested motherboards performed at the fastest timings available and a 2T Command Rate with 4 DIMMs on board, so even that is a non-issue."
Does that mean that if 4 sticks of ram are installed, there won't be a performance hit and it will work just as fast as 2 sticks installed?